[Wikipedia-l] Minority/majority question

Sat Jul 31 19:05:32 UTC 2004

Gutza wrote:

> Ok, I hoped I could avoid saying what this is about, but I should have 
> seen the RO/HU assumptions coming -- and it's only natural. The 
> article in question is the one about Jesus. The Romanian (Eastern) 
> Orthodox Church says that the name should be spelled "Iisus Hristos". 
> Other religions in Romania (mainly Catholic branches) say that the 
> Romanian name is Isus Cristos.
>
> So now you know. It's not about Timisoara, and on a personal note I 
> mildly resent the way you presented the analogy, as if Timisoara is 
> natively spelled Temesvár in the same way as Vienna is spelled "Wien"; 
> I honestly don't understand why you had to bring that into the 
> discussion out of nowhere. But let's not get into this now, it would 
> be a waste of our time.
>
> Anyhow, the dispute is basically not about the language itself, 
> because all religions who dispute the name do it in Romanian. On a 
> side note, to put your mind at ease before you assume it as being the 
> case, no Magyars are involved in the dispute itself.

I'm glad that you've clearly identified.  I thought that your approach 
in your approach in your first letter was needlessly evasive.  
Personally, I was guessing something based on the speech differences 
between Romanian and Moldovan, but now I realize that it has to do with 
the Greeks and that there is no  imminent Eskimo uprising in Timisoara. 
:-)   People do bring these issues out of nowhere when they are left to 
guess about the problem.

Going with the majority (Google or otherwise) is never satisfactory.  
That breeds the tyranny of the majority. In English these problems have 
been numerous in relation to usages by the British and Americans.  
French, Spanish and Portuguese also encounter differences between 
European and New World versions. 

I would be asking questions like:  How does the secular press deal with 
the issue?  How was it dealt with in communist days? (Say what you might 
about them, I can't imagine that an atheist organization would favour 
one religion over the other.)  What does the Romanian Academy have to 
say about the matter?  Is there such a thing as an "official" religion 
in Romania?  I can see that the Orthodox version is based on a 
transliteration from the Greek, but how did the other version come to be 
what it is.  (Romanian, after all, is still a romance language.)  If 
reviewing all these question does not give *clear* guidance, you should 
accept both.  For each article where the question is relevant, the first 
form introduced in that article should have precedence.

Ec